It’s been a year of transition for the Hunting Hills Lightning senior volleyball teams.
Both teams have new faces on the bench with the boys returning four players and the girls three.
But both teams are making strides as they head toward the end of the season.
“We’ve made a huge improvement since the beginning of the season . . . every week we’ve gotten stronger,” said boys’ head coach Dave McKeage, who took last year off after coaching the junior varsity squad for several years. Prior to that he did work with the senior boys’ along with Arthur Pendle.
The Lightning went into the season with power hitters Chris Petersen and Krishen Singh, setter Mackenzie Wright and libero Chris Moritz returning.
“Our power hitters are our strength with both in Grade 12,” said McKeage. “As well our setter has come a long way.”
Wright grew close to nine inches since last year, which took some adjusting on his part, said McKeage.
“He started this year playing like a five-foot-eight or five-foot-nine setter instead of a six-foot-four setter,” he said. “But he’s learning and is starting to dominate hitters at the net and run the offence as a bigger setter. He’s made huge strides and I’m certainly pleased.”
The Lightning offence is solid, but it will be defence that helps them win, said McKeage.
“We’re not as big, or hit the ball as hard, as the other teams in our zone (Lindsay Thurber and Notre Dame), so for us to have success we have to be scrappy, get our hands on a lot of balls and get them up. Our middles have also improved significantly and have to be a big factor in our defence.”
Two of the three middle blockers — Jackson Oborne and Matt Mackie — are in Grade 11 with Mitch James in Grade 12. The other players up from the JV program are libero Matt Lyons, setter Ky McLachlin and right side Blayne Friesen.
The Lightning, LTCHS Raiders and the Notre Dame Cougars are fighting for the one spot open to compete at the provincials. Notre Dame has already finished first and will host the winner of the LTCHS-Lightning semifinal match.
“It’s a tough division as both Thurber and Notre Dame have been ranked in the top 10 most of the season,” said McKeage. “They both have a lot of veterans, but we’re getting closer to them.”
Blake MacKay, who has been with the junior varsity team the last several years, took over the senior girls’ team from Scott Luck.
“I coached senior a lot of years ago,” explained MacKay, who has outside hitter Jaden Robinson, middle/power hitter Taylor Sawchuk and setter Dana Stoyberg returning.
“We do have a good group of girls, who work hard,” said MacKay. “We’ve been up and down this season, but we’re improving. We have a lot of girls up from JV and it took time for them to figure out that this is a much faster game. They’ve all been working a lot on the little things and we’re getting better.”
MacKay sees the team’s strength as their hitting and weakness defence.
“We work hard at practice on digging and blocking and team defence,” he said.
Of the new faces middle Shaw Gurney moved in from Prince George while defensive specialist Teagan Booth is in Grade 12. The others — setter Emma Delemont, middle Nicole Fischer, right side/middle Cherisse Johannson, power Mackenzie Kohut, libero Jill McAllister and power hitters Jaedyn Paarup and Erika Pearson — are all in Grade 11.
Both Hunting Hills teams lost in the quarter-finals of their annual tournament Saturday.
The Raiders defeated the Lightning 17-25, 25-14, 15-12 on the boys’ side and Edmonton Strathcona stopped the Lightning 25-14, 25-12 in girls’ action.
The Raiders went on to down Spruce Grove 25-16, 31-29, 26-24 in the boys’ semifinals before losing 25-23, 25-20, 24-26, 21-25, 12-15 to Bev Facey in the final.
Facey downed Notre Dame 25-13, 27-25, 25-20 in the semifinals after beating Harry Ainlay of Edmonton 2-1 in the quarter-finals.
Notre Dame stopoed Spruce Grove 25-22, 25-20 in the bronze medal game. Earlier they downed Calgary Western Canada 25-19, 23-25, 15-7 in the quarter-finals. In the opening round of playoffs, Hunting Hills beat Archbishop O’Leary of Edmonton 25-20, 25-18, and Notre Dame downed Calgary’s Centennial 25-7, 25-14.
On the girls’ side, Lindsay Thurber downed Western Canada 25-16, 25-11 and Notre Dame stopped Spruce Grove 27-29, 25-20, 15-12 in the opening round of playoffs. Other quarter-final games saw LTCHS defeated Grande Prairie 25-19, 22-25, 15-13 while Lethbridge Chinook stopped Notre Dame 25-12, 25-12 and Ainlay beat Centennial 2-0.
The semifinals saw Ainlay down LTCHS 25-14, 25-23, 16-25, 25-15 and Chinook stop Strathcona 3-0.
Strathcona defeated the Raiders 12-25, 30-28, 15-13 in the third-place game and Chinook downed Ainlay 25-20, 25-22, 25-21 in the final.